Ten Films That Weren't at Comic Con ... But Should Have Been

Sure, this year's Comic-Con event was steeped with geeky goodness, with plenty of movies, TV shows and -- if you looked hard enough -- even comic books arriving with presentations and panels intended to satisfy every fanboy and girl in attendance. But what wasn't being royally hyped that maybe missed out this year?

1. The Adventures of Tintin: Based on a classic Belgian comic strip, Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson's trilogy of motion-capture films has been in the works for a while now, with Spielberg having wrapped filming on his first chapter in March of 2009. Surely, in the sixteen months since, they've could've had a polished teaser prepared for the San Diego masses. Co-writer Edgar Wright and co-stars Simon Pegg and Nick Frost were already in town plugging their latest ventures, and Jackson might've been able to make an appearance while waiting for The Hobbit to finally get off the ground. (Spielberg's already cracking away at getting War Horse in theaters next August -- that's right, before Tintin even hits.) However, just because Tron: Legacy decided to give everyone a taste a year and a half out doesn't mean that these two wanted to follow suit; don't be so surprised if this lot dominates Hall H come this time next year.

2. The Cabin in the Woods: The first teaser posters for this reportedly clever horror flick dropped at Comic-Con last summer, among the world's heaviest concentration of Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard fans. However, in the year that's passed, their completed film got delayed from an early 2010 release to an early 2011 date in favor of a 3D enhancement, and now its release is completely TBD as MGM's finances are MIA. If it were still on for an intended January opening, I'm sure that we would've seen a panel dedicated to it, maybe even a trailer, but at the moment, Whedon's got bigger things to worry about...

3. The third Batman film: Look, I'm not saying it would've been reasonable to expect an update for Christopher Nolan a mere week after Inception's release, but it feels like tradition by now to get the speculation machine up and running (see: every other blog wondering if Joseph Gordon-Levitt will play The Riddler). At the very least, Nolan could've sat there and denied everything that Gary Oldman accidentally said at last year's event.

4. That prequel to The Thing: If we could get some small consolation last year on the direction that Elm Street remake would be going in (and we all saw how that turned out), I would've loved to get an idea of how this prequel/sequel/remake/reboot/whatsit to John Carpenter's classic is shaping up. It'll be out by the end of next April (as Elm was this year), so instead of Comic-Con, we'll just wait for a regular poster to drop, a regular trailer to tease and a regular release like we do for every other movie. Shucks.

5. The next Transformers: If I told you that I was excited for this, I'd be lying, but the only thing that kept one of 2011's no-duh record-breakers from having anything on display is that, well, Michael Bay's still shooting it at the moment. Some might argue, though, that if we can get a camera test out of Captain America, then we could at least get an early glimpse at whichever robot's surrogate testes will be swinging our way in 3D.

6. X-Men: First Class and 7. Planet of the Apes: Rise of the Apes: Fox didn't seem to have much of a presence this year beyond Machete (unless you count the Gulliver's Travels trailer that reportedly played twice post-Hall H stabbing), and that's understandable given that neither of their big geek properties has anything to show for itself beyond a cast. That didn't stop Marvel from trotting out the assembled Avengers two years out...

8.The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader: One thing Fox could've pushed, though, would've been this winter's next installment of the family-friendly franchise. Then again, it's not like they need the buzz, and maybe trotting out a mock ship up against everything Tron-related would've been too potent a glimpse into their looming box office battle.

9. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn: My apathy towards the giant robots extends similarly to the vamp/wolf/true love triangle of the Twilight series, but while I understand that the lengthy delay between the final two films means that the legions of K-Stew and R-Pattz won't be back in full force until next year's inevitable panel, it still started to resemble something like tradition to have the young girls camping out and the old boys complain about all the precious seats they're talking up in Hall H that day.

(Regardless, I will take this opportunity to plug an astute piece over at Pajiba all about the Twilight fan-fic authors who held their ground at this year's event, albeit off-site. And yes, I sometimes write for that site, but more importantly, I didn't write this particular piece, and as a writer, I kinda wish that I had.)

10. Waiting for "Superman": Now I know that very few Comic-Con attendees would have the slightest interest in a documentary on public education reform from the director of An Inconvenient Truth, but tell me that you couldn't have probably lured a handful of them in with that title. Hey, just sayin', they could've pulled it off.